An Hour with Alison Wong

Written by Rachel Ogier

An Hour with Alison Wong chaired by Graham Beattie

The Present Past

The platform was set up like someone’s idea of a library. There were two leather chairs sitting on a Persian rug, framed by potted palms. The rows and rows of chairs facing the platform made this setup seem a little shabby and fake.

Despite this silly façade it soon felt like a fireside chat. In the same way that reading a novel requires a suspension of disbelief - that the events told are real, that the characters matter and are more than flat type on a page - I could believe that Alison Wong had just popped in for a casual chat, with Graham Beattie along to chaperone.

Beattie kicked off the hour with a long list of Wong’s credentials: grants, awards and fellowships; a collection of poetry and a novel, then turned the conversation to Wong’s Hawke’s Bay childhood.

Wong grew up speaking English and just a few scattered phrases of Cantonese. She did not consider herself Chinese, and it wasn’t until she reached standard three at school that she realised she was different from the children around her.

Both sides of Wong’s family have been in New Zealand since before 1900, so she is a New Zealander by any definition. Yet she is classified as a Chinese-New Zealand author, and that duality runs throughout her work, as it has her life.

Despite loving reading as a child, and feeling attracted to the emotional pull of stories, Wong studied mathematics at university. She said “I was trying to be a good Chinese girl… it never occurred to me you could be a writer". Like many of their generation, Wong’s parents worked hard to enable her to go to university - and she felt under pressure to get a good, respectable degree to lead into a solid, respectable job.

Entry into the Creative Writing Course at Victoria University was a turning point, “that was a beginning for me". Her 2006 collection of poems entitled Cup came out of this course, and was shortlisted at the 2007 Montana New Zealand Book Awards. Yet Wong admitted writing still doesn’t come easily to her, “I struggle to get words out".

As requested by Beattie, Wong read a poem from Cup. Playground is rich in small details illuminated by Wong’s explanation that the first section took place in a very particular playground, before the action shifts to a McDonald’s Playland. Her son was three at the time the poem was written, she continued, and was embarrassed that his mother continued to share it. Playground featured some beautifully drawn children’s dialogue, and ended on a punch line at which the audience laughed, appreciative.

A second poem was not from Cup, but was read off a clipboard. It described bed time stories, and the tension her son felt at nine years old about his heritage. He didn’t want to be Chinese.

The theme of being Chinese in New Zealand continued with a reading from Wong’s first novel: 2009’s As the Earth Turns Silver. Set in Wellington, the novel stretches from the 1890s to 1920s. It describes the relationship between a Chinese man and a Pakeha woman. The action in the book centres around the tension between the lovers arising as a result of, for want of a better word, race. Because of the anti-Chinese legislation of the time, they were forced to meet at night, when the moon made the world look silver. Wong read a passage from the title chapter. Rich in geographical detail, it described a tender moment between the lovers as they visit Oriental Parade at night.

To Wong, history is a way of looking at the present. She noted, “there’s not a lot you can do about history… but it’s good for us to learn from it". The incidents described in the book prompt us to examine our attitude towards people who are different - different in any way, Wong clarified. There are more differences than just race.

Wong’s work asks us to have compassion; to show tolerance, understanding and forgiveness. After all, she said, “people are people”.